The leader of the Australian Green Party has launched an attack on the attitude of Prime Minister John Howard to gay equality. Senator Bob Brown has spoken out against what he sees as the incumbent government's use of issues such as same-sex marriage to win votes. "I think he panders to homophobia in our society because he thinks it's been a vote winner and I think he's wrong," Senator Brown told reporters. "We're way behind a whole raft of other countries. This is not a light matter, this is about people legally deprived, defrauded of their rights. It's very, very wrong." Senator Brown called on Howard to enact new legislation to end discrimination against same-sex couples. An audit of federal laws and their impact on same-sex couples and their children was undertaken by the Human Rights and Equal Opportunity Commission (HREOC) and presented to the federal parliament in June. It found that same-sex couples and families get fewer leave entitlements, less workers' compensation, fewer tax concessions, fewer veterans' entitlements, fewer health care subsidies, less superannuation and pay more for residential aged care than opposite-sex couples in the same circumstances. The report traced this pervasive inequality back to how lesbian and gay couples are excluded from federal law's definitions of couples, partners and spouses. It listed the 58 laws that need to be changed to grant gay, bisexual and lesbian Australians equal rights. Howard said that despite a new opinion poll showing 71% of Australians favouring equal rights for gay people, he is still opposed. "We are not in favour of discrimination, but of course our views on the nature of marriage in our community are very well known and they won't be changing," he said in an interview with Sky television. Ref: Pinknews.co.uk (m)
Credit: GayNZ.com News Staff
First published: Friday, 12th October 2007 - 11:41am